This followed me home

[Donny Lawson]

Here is some nice solid Spalted Hackberry that followed me home today. I can see a few bowls and some real nice pen blanks. I hope to get to it this weekend. I want to see what it looks like on the inside.

[robert baccus]

Nice wood---just love hackberry.

[charlie knighton]

pretty stuff, Donny

i have only turned one piece of hackberry, off ebay, and like concrete, this looks spalted but probably green, or freshly cut, i do not really see a sign of pith, can you turn it whole with the pith included??

[Robert Henrickson]

i have only turned one piece of hackberry, off ebay, and like concrete, this looks spalted but probably green, or freshly cut, i do not really see a sign of pith, can you turn it whole with the pith included??

"Like concrete" -- my experience with hackberry has been quite the opposite.

Turning a hollow vessel with the pith included on axis hasn't been a problem in my experience.

[bob svoboda]

Nice looking wood-will look forward to seeing what you do with it.

[Scott Hackler]

Nice! We have tons of Hackberry around here and its a pretty wood, spalted or not. My experience when turning side grain is leave plenty of extra to allow for warping. Most of my Hackberry bowl rough outs warped so oval that they couldn't be re-turned round!

But anything I have done end grain was fairly stable. I made a handful of wine glass like goblets (end grain) just to practice and they air dried straight even with a 1/4" stem.

[Bernie Weishapl]

Ditto what Scott said. I definitely would leave extra wood when turning side grain.

[Jon Nuckles]

My experience with hackberry was that all my roughouts cracked horribly. They were a uniform thickness and wrapped in several layers of heavy paper. It may have been something about the particular tree, but if I turn any in the future I will anchorseal the roughouts.

[robert baccus]

I love hackberry--it spalts despite my ignoring it. Mostly done endgrain vases and some SG bowls without any loss, but i do wax bowls allover and vases on the outside only. Sells well yeah. Having tried bags, DA and spanish moss gathered on full moon nights, the nuke box,.. I still consider all these witchcraft.

[robert baccus]

Love hackberry for sure. Cuts good, spalts anywhere and sells well. I consider bags, DA, boiling, and nuking to be witchcraft of course. Wax the outsides, mouth, base and throw it in a shady corner for 6 months. Easy yeah.